


Black Winged Angel, White Serpent

by arealshitwizard (gaiusgallus), gaiusgallus



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Angel Crowley, Crowley as Raphael, Demon Aziraphale, Eden - Freeform, Fallen Angel Aziraphale (Good Omens), Reverse Omens
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-30
Updated: 2019-07-30
Packaged: 2020-07-25 22:46:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20033596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gaiusgallus/pseuds/arealshitwizard, https://archiveofourown.org/users/gaiusgallus/pseuds/gaiusgallus
Summary: If Aziraphale and Crowley switched places! Does what it says on the tin. An angel and a demon meet in Eden.





	Black Winged Angel, White Serpent

A serpent slithered up the wall, scales a brilliant white in the fading sun. Crowley glanced down with feigned disinterest, and then leveled his gaze out at the desert. He had been watching the humans make their first delicate steps through the hot sand and was trying not to imagine what would come next for them. It made his stomach turn, and was in fact the first instance of anxiety recorded in the known universe. The snake was a welcome diversion, but Crowley was meant to be watching, so he couldn’t very well let the snake know as much.

“Well, went down as good as it could have, I suppose!” A chipper voice broke the silence. Crowley turned to see a round, jovial looking man standing next to him atop the wall.

“Mm?” Crowley hummed. The man’s aura spoke ‘demon’ and his eyes were like chips of ice set in a friendly face. A slight sheen of scales tinged the skin below his jaw, iridescent.

“Could have been much worse,” The demon mused. He had a disarming smile and impish features, a thorough disguise. “Could have been smote outright. She does seem to relish Her punishments. Really, ejecting them from the garden is one of the nicer things She could have done.”

Crowley nodded but attempted to keep his face neutral. He took in the soft figure. The demon wore silt gray robes with an earthy brown trim, and a sparkling blue clasp that appeared to be a serpent’s eye spun from glass. The demon’s hair was, ironically, a halo of shocking white curls that framed his rounded face. His wings were a deep grey, and the speckles and markings reminded him of that bird the humans had affectionately named ‘pigeon’. Remembering Eve’s face lighting up as she held the cooing bird made his stomach sour with renewed vigor.

“You’re not wrong.” Crowley said finally. The demon turned to face him, grinning. His eyes were wide and bright. There was very little sclera visible around too-large irises that were a powder blue. The pupils were tiny pin pricks in the center, barely there. Crowley had to suppress a shudder. They were eyes that seemed to see right through your affectations, into the reality of your heart.

Not that Crowley ever put on affectations, mind you. He would never admit to such. He only admitted to being a very proper sort of angel who was always happy with his work, never doubting anything said or ordered by The Host, thank you very much.

“Aziraphale.” The demon offered, still smiling as beatifically as was possible for a creature of The Great Pit.

“Crow- er, Raphael.”

“Oh I knew you looked familiar! That red hair, really makes an impression. You hung the stars, yes? Always did like stars, wonderful job.”

Crowley tried not to prick up and preen at the compliment. He particularly loved his stars, thought they were much better than the Earth in almost every way. The firmament was a testament to the fact that Crowley could do a very good job… when he wanted to. He seemed to have mucked up this whole Eden thing, though.

“Yup, them’s me.” He said, too casually. Aziraphale picked up on the pride in his voice and beamed.

Aziraphale hummed under his breath, and then asked airily, “Crow?”

Crowley awkwardly picked at a hem on his robe.

“Crowley. Actually. Just, something I’m kicking around. Call it a ‘nickname’. Crows are…” He floundered and finished lamely, “Cool.”

He’d seen one of the sleek, black birds a few weeks ago. It had been cawing up a storm, and then fixed him with a gaze that seemed too intelligent for so small an animal. He’d taken up feeding the crows whatever bits of fruit and food the humans left behind. If he was the sort that would question Her, which he absolutely was not, he might have wondered why She’d given him such a stuffy name in the first place. He’d grown fond of the birds, their wings almost as dark as his, and had mentally toyed with the idea of renaming himself.

What harm could it do?

“So what is an archangel of your status doing here in Eden, Crowley?” He said the name grandly, with a round pronunciation that hinted at teasing. Crowley squirmed with embarrassment.

“Could ask the same of you couldn’t I, demon?” He deflected.

“You could. Would you?” The demon’s tone was almost fond, and he sidled a step closer to Crowley’s side. The sky was darkening, the first clouds rolling in from the south.

“Would you tell me the truth? You’re a demon, lying is your deal, yeah?” Crowley was pointedly trying to avoid answering Aziraphale’s question.

He had been sent to watch the humans, but that had gotten boring very quickly. They had little interest in speaking to him, too curious and excited about the Garden and each other to pay him much mind. The Principalities at each gate were boring as well. They stiffly answered his questions, and shooed him away when he attempted anything resembling ‘small talk’, which was a brand new invention that he’d been eager to try out.

His only real job was to keep the humans away from the Tree of Knowledge, which had been all too easy. He simply had walked up to Adam and said, ‘Look, you can eat whatever you like, as long as you leave that great big tree in the middle alone. Seriously, tastes terrible, no good, don’t even bother.’ Adam had smiled and agreed amicably, then gone off to frolic with Eve in the river. And that had been it. Warning completed. He had checked it off his mental to-do list, which really had only the one item.

Where had it gone wrong? He didn’t understand why they would have gone against his explicit (albeit one-time) instruction.

“Sent up to do a bit of reconnaissance. See what the other side was getting up to with this human business… And a spot of temptation, if I could manage it.” Aziraphale supplied. Crowley’s face screwed up tightly.

“Well if you think you can tempt me, you’d better wiggle back down there,” He replied snootily. Aziraphale’s ceaseless smile seemed to widen, impossibly.

“Oh of course, don’t suppose I could ever tempt an archangel such as yourself. Same goes for those Principalities, so sure of themselves.” Something like regret flickered on the demon’s face, but the smile won out. “Eve, however, very sweet thing, so dear.” Crowley tried not to let distaste show on his face, but failed. He was expressive to a fault. “She came across me, gave me a lovely name. ‘Serpent’, how delightful!” The demon really did look pleased, almost endeared.

“You gave her the apple.” Crowley said, his voice flat.

“Didn’t even have to hand it to her! Well, of course I didn’t, awful hard to do without hands. Simplest thing in the world. Just told her it must be quite good, if She was saving it all to Herself,” Aziraphale’s eyes closed slightly and he hummed to himself. “It really was scrumptious, so it hardly was a lie at all!”

“You ate it too?” Crowley spat indignantly, “Angels- demons don’t need to eat, what would you go and do a thing like that for?” A thunderclap rolled low across the desert, and he turned away to see the humans were now pinpricks against the far away sand.

“The humans seem to have this pleasure thing down pat already. The look on their faces when they eat was simply marvelous, how could I resist? Have you really resisted, my dear, all the earthly pleasures of the Garden?” Crowley’s face burned, both at the insinuation and the endearment. The demon chuckled. “No, I suppose you haven’t. I could have sworn I saw you sleeping in the shade of a pomegranate tree.”

“You didn’t!” Crowley shot back testily.

A rain drop fell at his feet. He tried very hard to ignore it.

“I suppose I didn’t, then.” Aziraphale replied. He arched a grey wing overhead, and offered it to Crowley, who sidled closer to be out of the first rain.

He most likely had. Crowley had taken very well to the human habit of napping, for the same reason the demon had eaten of the fruit. The humans had looked so sweet in their sleep, woken with such wonderful smiles, and occasionally even spoken to him of the fanciful things they dreamt while they rested. So what if he had tried it out, once or twice or for a solid week when he’d been out of his mind with boredom? The Host didn’t seem to mind. At least, She hadn’t said anything. She’d been awful quiet in general, lately, since Eden had gotten going.

They stood atop the wall, the humans finally disappearing over the horizon. Aziraphale’s smile relaxed, and he tutted under his breath. “Well, now what will we do?”

“We?” Crowley responded. His hand brushed the burnished trumpet cinched to his waist and he couldn’t help but flinch at the feel of the cool metal against his long fingers.

Aziraphale hummed and then said, “Well, the Principalities left as soon as the gates didn’t need guarding, and I haven’t heard from my side yet, although I do hope this earns me a commendation!” Crowley shot him a dark look, and he smiled queasily. “Sorry, dear, but it’s in my nature. Seems to me we’re the only ones left on Earth aside from the humans.”

“S’pose I’m meant to follow them,” Crowley said, but his feet remained rooted. “Watching them was sorta my main job. The other…” The trumpet sounding, the opening of Heaven’s gates and the war, hellfire, wrath... “Shouldn’t need to worry for a while, anyway.”

Aziraphale regarded the trumpet and his smile finally disappeared. A look of consternation replaced it, and the demon became the second being in existence to experience anxiety, something his side would lean into quite heavily and gleefully inflict on humanity in the millennia to come. “Ah, I see. Yes, one should hope so.”

They stood atop the wall as the rain poured, and said nothing more.


End file.
